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The mom and boyfriend were at a casino and just happen to have videotaped alibis

The cat was being boarded. Who boards a cat for a night out? Leave it food and water and they're good for a few days.

The owner of the house (her ex) owes two mortgages on it, and isn't allowed near it due to a restraining order

The owner tried to file bankruptcy to get out of the mortgages but was denied.

Nothing suspicious here, move along

Somehow I suspect there will be a very interesting follow up in a few weeks.

Do not pass go, do not collect insurance settlement, go directly to jail.

Boarding a cat? really? 4-5 days easy without even scooping the liter. Leave a faucet dripping very slowly, use 4 or 5 liter boxes and a self dispensing feeder that holds 7-8lbs of food and a single cat is good for at least a month if needed.

Seems like too much of a coincidence for sure. I'm guessing they overestimated the amount of boom you get, or expected it to light off sooner and just burn the house down. Would be more believeable if they were on vacation, not gone for one night and they let the cat get blown up.

Natural gas explosions in homes are one of the few moments where even hollywood falls short on how much damage is caused (usually they are over the top).

Something as simple as looseening a threaded pipe, then just wait for the contactor on a refrigerator or a deep freeze in the basement to light it off. OR set the thermostat schedule at an ideal time, hours after you've left. With natrual gas, there's plenty of ignition sources. It doesn't take much in the right concentration.

2 counts of manslaughters, public endangerment, maybe some charges as a terrorist under the Patriot Act, with a little insurance fraud to go with it. Throw in criminal conspiracy for those that had knowledge.

This is sad. Yesterday we were at a home and the customer said that her "Steam Boiler" was making a funny noise and an air vent blew. So she hit the emergency switch. When we open the cover the high presure switch was jumped. She said a different company was there 2 weeks ago and they charged her $150 and got the heat going... how lucky do you think she got!

I haven't seen any pictures of this tragic incident but with natgas being lighter than air, ignition normally occurs at the bottom of the cloud where the right fuel/air mixture is. Opposite for propane as it is heavier than air. Therefore if the roof is completely gone but some walls left it could be natgas but if roof there and walls are gone, propane or another vapor state accelerant could be the cause. This is known as "roof in basement syndrome". A 30lb BBQ propane tank leaking in the basement could build up without odour being detected if the leak was slow enough to fill the basement and the furnace blower was not circulating the air. Stratified gas could then be ignited when the top of the propane cloud got high enough for another ignition source such as the electrical contacts on the fridge as previously suggested. There is tremendous power in that amount of gas.
Unless an expert is there to tell the difference, a propane explosion could be mistaken as a natgas incident.
Fire and explosion investigators have a ton of knowledge to determine the cause. If there is a good one involved they will solve this.

As a side note, there is over 100 times the chance of a fatality in a propane explosion than in a natural gas explosion.

They are being quiet. No issues with gas lines exterior to the house. The ex husband is the one pointing to the furnace, the ex wife who lives there says no furnace issue but boyfriend changed the stat to get heat on. First said no gas issues then said daughter smelled gas but they did nothing.